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Hi all, I have a few questions about sharpening AEB-L steel compared to Victorinox Forschner steel. I recently bought a Richmond Artifex 240mm. I am a prep cook for a high volume catering company and I do a lot of meat prep on plastic cutting boards.

I am having a bit of trouble sharpening and developing a burr on the Artifex. I got a combination sharpening stone from a family member, which may be a budget stone from Chinatown. It seems to develop a burr easily on a Forschner. Is this normal? From what I've researched, AEB-L seems to be an easy to sharpen stainless steel. Is AEB-L suppose to be harder to sharpen than the Forschner steel? And do I seem to have an extremely slow cutting stone.

The Artifex does get sharp after a long time of sharpening; however, after a full day of preping both the Artifex and Forschner gets dull, but the Forschner seem to feel a bit sharper. Would this be mainly due to the natural thinness of the stamped Forschner blade?

I do plan on purchasing quality stones, but have yet to jump the gun; I'm trying to figure this out first.

AEB-L should develop a burr quite easily and the edge retention should be better regardless of preparation. It sounds like you are sharpening at a steeper angle than the stock edge and you are only abrading the shoulder above the edge, as opposed to the actual edge. Either keep on going until you establish new bevels or increase the blade to stone angle. Forschners lose their edge quite rapidly for a lot of reasons but mostly the steel is softer than most of the steel we talk about here.

The blade is so terribly thick behind the edge, that one will need a lot of force to actually cut with it. All that steel will cause a lot of friction. That's why a very thick edge may be less durable than a thinner one.

When the website says it's a convex grind and the edge is V at 15 degrees, does that mean the primary cutting bevel is convex or the secondary bevel (above the cutting edge) is convex?

I have used the magic marker trick on the first sharpen to make sure I was sharpening at the 15 degree factory angle. I did the same yesterday to make sure I was still sharpening at the same angle, and it seems to be the case.

I'll try to take and upload some pictures tomorrow when I have better lighting.

Obviously this knife is thick as a brick and bricks don't sharpen up easily plus you've got AEB-L which might mean it's not so easy to sharpen if the heat treat isn't tweaked to perfection. FYI, AEB-L might not be a great steel for mass production.

Anyway, what I see you needing to do (barring returning the knife) is to get some really coarse stones, mark your edge so that you can see where you're hitting at, and then grind from the top of the factory bevel down to the cutting edge and burr formation.

Keep in mind that this knife will never perform as a thin knife will, if you want performance (aside from lobster splitting performance - you've already got that covered) look at almost anything else talked about here.